Bleached Avatars: The Legend of the Spiritbenders
by Artemis Goldborough
Summary: Shunsui Kyoraku and Jushiro Ukitake find themselves in another world. They are human. Their shinigami powers are gone. They must travel this world. Very,very AU. OOC. Non-slash. A larger blended expanded world of Avatar: The Last Airbender and the Legend of Korra, with alternate bending versions of many of the Bleach Characters living in it and some elements of the Bleach Universe.
1. Bound By Snow

Sumarary: The lead characters are Shunsui Kyoraku and Jushiro Ukitake. They're very simlar to their cannon counterparts as are their memories of the world they left. Everything in their new world is a very well blended mixture of the worlds of Avatar The Last Airbender, The Legend of Korra, and Bleach characters with my own ideas thrown in the mix.

Author Notes: This is an odd idea that apeared in my mind at about three o'clock in the morning when I was trying to write more of my other Bleach fan fic, HE WASN'T LATE. This idea just wouldn't leave me alone. I had to write it. I have only the loosest of notions of where this could be going.

Disclaimer: I do not own these characters or this fictional universe. Tite Kubo created Bleach. Michael Dante DiMartino and Bryan Konitzko created Avatar: The Last Airbender and The Legend Of Korra. This is just a fun writing exercise.

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CHAPTER ONE: BOUND BY SNOW

Shunsui Kyoraku woke up groaning. The first thing he was aware of was the cold. His whole body felt frozen. His feet were the coldest. _This is not the eighth barrack, _Shunsui thought. He opened his eyes. He was lying down in snow. His back was against the ground. He was facing a grey clouded sky. _Nope, definitely not the eighth barrack. It's not the Soul Society either. Where am I?_

Shunsui laid still for a second before moving. He had a very specific mental of what he looked like and what he should be wearing. Shunsui's usual clothed consisted of a black hakama with a white haori. The haori was mostly hidden by a ladies pink kimono with a floral pattern. His hair was long and brown, worn in a low ponytail. On top of his head he typically wore a straw hat. On his feet he wore sandals.

As Shunsui looked down at his body, his chest, his arms, and his legs, he noticed that almost none of what he thought was currently true. He was not dressed the same at all. His feet were bare. On his legs were loose dark green pants. Over his chest was a short sleeved tunic, a light green trimmed with yellow and darker shades of green. There were bands of dark green cloth on his wrist, also trimmed with yellow.

Shunsui sat up. He felt an unbalanced weight on his back. A piece of thin rope sat on his shoulders. The rope was connected to whatever was on his back. Shunsui felt along his back. He picked up the item which felt like straw. He lifted it and the rope over his head. It was a straw hat. _That's not exactly the kind I wear, _Shunsui thought, _Well at least it's a hat. _

Shunsui stood up. With one hand he held the hat. With the other hand he ran fingers through his hair. His was jaw length. _I haven't worn my hair this short since I was a kid, _he thought. He placed the hat on his head. He crossed his arms then beginning rubbing them. Shunsui chanted something. Nothing happened. _No kido! I don't have my Zanpakuto. I don't have my powers…If I stay out here, wherever here is, then I'm going to freeze to death! _Shunsui looked forwards. For as far as the eye could see there was nothing but flat snow covered land. He turned to his left and saw the same. Then he turned completely around. What Shunsui saw then, made his eyes go wide with alarm. It sent him running forward.

On the ground up ahead of him was a man lying face down in the snow. The man's hair was white. His hair was straight and pulled back in a low ponytail. The man was slender of form. He was dressed in a dark blue anorak with a white fur collar. His pants were a dark blue trimed with same white fur. On his hands were blue mitts. On his feet were mukluks.

Shunsui rushed over to the man. He turned the man over on to his side. Shunsui's eyes went even wider than before. "Jushiro?" he said.

The man coughed up blood and snow. The man nodded. His face was very familiar to Shunsui. This was Jushiro Ukitake. The clothes he should have been wearing were the black hakama and haori, the clothes of the shinigami captains. There were only three other changes in his apearnce. The first change was his skin. His skin was several shades darker than it should have been; it was a light shade of brown. The second was his hair. Shunsui had not seen Jurshiro with his hair pulled back in almost a hundred years. As for the third…

"Your eyebrows are as white as your hair," Shunsui blurted out.

Jushiro smiled weakly. His face became suddenly confused. "Your eyes are green?"

"No, they're not!" Shunsui said, "I'll have you know, my eyes are a very nice shade of brown."

"Not anymore," Jushiro said. He sat up. He looked around. "Where are we?"

"I don't know." Shunsui said. He looked in the one direction he had not looked before. Off in the distance, there was something that might be a river.

"The last thing I remember," Jurshiro said, "I was training with new members of my division. I had to stop because of illness." "I was in the office with Nanao-chan." Shunsui grinned. "She was complaining again about doing most of the paper work. Better her than me. I laid my head down on the desk. The next thing I knew I was here." Shunsui rubbed at his arms. "It's cold, so cold here. I don't how I got these clothes, but boy am I ever dressed wrong!"

"My Zanpakuto," Jushiro said, "Where is it?"

Shunsui did his best to shrug. With his teeth chattering and his body shuddering from cold, the shrug was less than effective.

"I can't do kido!" Jushiro shouted, "What's going on? What-" Jushiro started coughing again.

Shunsui became worried when the coughing did not stop for over a minute. When the coughing did stop, Jushiro passed out. Shunsui bent over his friend concerned. He spoke aloud as if Jushiro could hear him even though he knew this wasn't so. "That's the worst you've been in a long time. This is not a good place for that. If we were back home, I'd get you to Unohana." Shunsui gazed around at the snow. "Wherever this is, I don't think there are any hospitals near here!"

Shunsui lifted his friend. He draped Jushiro over his shoulders. Shunsui dragged his friend far more than he carried him. "Either you've gotten heavier," Shunsui said, "Or I've gotten weaker. Maybe Nanao-chan is right about laziness leading to weakness." Left unspoken was the thought, _if I don't find us a shelter somewhere, we may die out here!"_

Shunsui walked toward where he thought there was a river. Snow began to fall heavily. Soon it was a full on blizzard. _I can't go any further…I must…I can't! _Shunsui collapsed. Was because of the cold, his exhaustion, or the weight of his friend? He wasn't sure. He only knew that he could not take a step further. Shunsui laid down on the snow near the river. The ground beneath him began to crack. It was then he realized his mistake. There might have been snow under him but beneath the snow was not ground. It was ice. The river was no river but a break in the ice. The ice continued to break around Shunsui. It almost separated him from Jushiro who was now laying next to him. Shunsui grabbed a tight hold on his friend hugging him closely to his side. He rolled himself and Jushiro away from the edge of the widening crack in the ice. He soon found that they were on a floating chunk of ice.

"Seriously," Shunsui said, "not a good day." He closed his eyes.

He awoke to heat. It was comforting. It was soothing. Shunsui heard voices speaking.

"Really Rangiku, do you have to be so aggressive?" a man asked. There was the sound of a door slamming.

_That voice, _Shunsui thought, _I know that voice. Isn't he supposed to be dead?_

"You can open your eyes I know you're awake," the man said, "Your breathing changed. The rhythm of your heart is moving at a slight faster beat."

Shunsui opened his eyes. The man who had spoken, was standing over him. "Ichimaru!" Shunsui shouted.

The man shook his head. "I assume Ichimaru is the name of a person. I do not know who that is. My name is Gin Kotetsu." The man was the image of Gin Ichimaru except for two things. His skin was darker, a light brown. His eyes were wide open revealing a blue color instead of green. Otherwise it was the same face. The white hair was the same in the same short style with the long bangs. The near constant smile was the same. The man's clothes were not. He was dressed in long sleeved light blue robes. The robes were trimmed in white fur.

"My friend the fire bender got a little too angry at the sight of you," the man said, "I'm afraid she singed your hair a bit."

Shunsui looked around. He was on a cot. The room was small. The walls were wooden planks. The room seemed to be rocking. "Where am I? What land? What world?"

Gin's brows went up. "Oh my, you don't know? You're near the city of Kuruk. You're onboard a Water Tribe ship."

This guy doesn't act like the Gin I knew, Shunsui thought. The Gin he knew was a traiter to the Soul Society, the world Shunsui was from. In in the Soul Socity Gin had been a captain of the gotei thirteen, much as Shunsui was. The captains were the leaders of the shinigami, the soul reapeers. Gin Ichimaru had betrayed them along with Aizen and Tousen. All three had been tratiors. All three had met traitors' fates. Both Ichimaru and Tousen had died in battle. Aizen had achieved his goal of becoming immortal and as such could not be killed. Instead, Aizen was imprisoned with a twenty thousand year life sentence in the deepest depths of the Maggot's Nest, the Soul Society's main prison

_Keep calm, Shunsui thought, Don't panic. That'll only get me in trouble faster. I do not have my shinigami powers right now. So for all intents and purpose I'm not a shinigami right now… I don't think this is the human world. Not the one I know of. It's not Hueco Mundo. Nor is it the Soul Society... This s man looks a lot like Gin Ichimaru…even has the same given name… something, some instinct, some intuition is telling me that it is not the same man. _

"Why so quiet," Gin asked, "The frost bite did not afect your throat."

"Frost bite?" Shunsui said.

Gin smiled widely, a sincere most unlike the expressions of Ichimaru. "Yes. You were suffering from that. I healed you of it. You were suffering from Hypothermia too. I had my fire bender friend help with that."

A small door at the end of the room burst open. A blonde haired woman with a large bust line stomped her way into the room. Her hair was pulled up in a high ponytail. Her red dress showed off her cleavage to great affect. "The prisoner is awake, I see," she said.

"Rangiku Masumoto!" Shunsui said.

The woman's brows went up in shock. Her brows then arched down more furious than before. "Earth Kingdom scum! How is it you know my name?" She moved faster than Shunsui could blink. She held a hand out in front of him. Hovering up the hand was a small flame. The flame was brought dangerly close to Shunsui's face.

On a small table beside the cot there was a bowl of water. Gin gestured with his left hand at it. He moved his hand as if lifting something unseen. The water corresponding to his movemnts, went upward floating out of the bowl. The water formed an impossible ball. The water moved to hover above the woman. The water fell drench the woman, her hand, and Shunsui.

The woman, Rangiku turned to glare at Gin. "How dare you!"

Gin raised a hand, and the water covering Rangiku and Shunsui instantly evaporated. "You're dry now. You have no reason to complain, Rangiku-chan."

"Chan is it?" It didn't seem possible but Rangiku looked even more mad. "I'll teach you not to call me a little girl!" She chased Gin out of the room. Gin was laughing the whole way.

_That, _Shunsui thought, _is not the Rangiku I know!_

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NEXT TIME: CHAPTER TWO: IMPRISONED BY ICE!


	2. Imprisoned In Ice

Disclaimer: I do not own these characters or this fictional universe. Tite Kubo created Bleach. Michael Dante DiMartino and Bryan Konietzko created Avatar: The Last Airbender and The Legend Of Korra. This is just a fun writing exercise.

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CHAPTER TWO: IMPRISONED BY ICE

Jushiro Ukitake opened his eyes. The last thing he remembered he was in a training room in the thirteenth barracks. _No, that's not_ _true, _he thought,_ the last I remember was a face that looked a lot like Shunsui. His eyes were wrong. He wasn't dressed like Shunsui. _Jushiro pulled back a layer of covers that were over him. looked at the blue clothes he was wearing. It was light weight robes in a sky blue color. It was clothing that he had never seen in his life. _That wasn't a dream, was it? _The sleeves of the robe went only down to the elbows. _My arms…they're tanned! No, not tanned._ Jushiro could see that the coloring ran fairly consistent across his body.

Jushiro lifted his head up. He looked around. He was in an large, elegant looking bedroom. The walls were white. The windows were across the room, shut tight with shudders. There the sound of howling winds coming from outside. _Where am I?_

"Shunsui!" Jushiro shouted. He tried to sit up. His body was weak. He fell quickly back down into the bed.

"Shunsui?" a woman asked, "Do you mean that Earth Kingdom fellow?"

Jurshiro turned his head to the left. There beside the bed in a chair was a woman he thought he knew. "Isane Kotetsu?"

The woman looked surprised. "That's my name. How do you know it?" The woman smiled as if finding something humorous. "It's strange. Rangiku-san said that the Kingdomer knew her name too."

The woman had light brown skin much like Jushiro now had. The woman had long white hair. Her hair was much longer than the Isane Kotetsu of his memories, whose hair was always kept short except for two braids on the left side of her head. The Isane beside him had two braids, one on each side of her hair. The rest of her hair was loose flowing down her back. From his current postion it was impossible to see just how long her hair was. Isane was not wearing the black uniform of the shinigami. Instead she wore a purple anourk and pants trimmed with off-fur.

"Kingdomer?" Jurshiro said, "What does that mean? What is the Earth Kingdom?"

Isane's brows went up. "You don't know? My older brother Gin said the same thing about that Kingdomer. How could you not know? That's like forgetting the basic facts of life! It is forgetting them!"

"Humor me," Jushiro said, "Assume I don't know."

"Okay," Isane said, "Just so you know, I've never had to explain this to anyone. Everyone knows it. I might not do a good job at it…Oh where do I began?" Isane tapped a finger against her forehead. "Let see…There are four basic elemental affinities, Earth, Air, Water, and Fire. For each element there is a different distinct racial and cultural identity, the Earth Kingdoms, the Water Tribes, the Air Islands, and the Fire Nations."

"Elements?" Jushiro asked.

Isane smiled as if he was being ridiculous. "The next thing you'll be telling me is that you don't what benders are."

"I don't," Jushiro said. Jushiro tried to do a wordless spell. Nothing happened. _It's true, _he thought, _I don't have my powers._

Isane laughed, a great noise filling the air. She shook with mirth for over a minute. When she had control of herself she was still grinning. "You don't know about benders? Everyone knows that. You're a water bender! I know it. You were bending in your sleep! You want to pretend otherwise? You want me to humor you and try to explain?"

Jushiro nodded._ What does she mean I was bending in my sleep? What is it she's speaking of?_

"Oh what the heck," Isane said, "It'll be good practice for when I have kids someday. After all, kids do have to be taught by their parents about the basics of the world. If I can't even explain to a stranger, how am I ever going to tell kids that stuff. Benders are the people with the power to bend the elements. They channel and control any nearby source of their element. Earthbenders bend the earth. Waterbenders like us bend the water. I think you get the idea."

"Are there people who bend more than one element?" Jushiro asked. _This is fascinating. I've never heard of anything quite like this. I can't say I'll believe until I see it but still…it is interesting._

Isane nodded. "There's a fifth element, a higher element, spirit. It's more rare. Not everyone can bend one of the four, not by a long shot. Only five in all the world, the chosen ones can bend all of the basic four and the fifth. Though there are a few others can bend one of the four and spirit. There are legends of other powers besides the elements but few believe those tales."

Jushiro raised his brows. "The ones?"

"The avatars," Isane said. She spoke as if quoting something. "Five are born. One from the children of the flame. One from the children of the waves. One from the children of the fields. One from the children of the wind. The fifth from those who were not blessed with the elements shall be the strongest. From the fifth, children with great elemental gifts may be born. For it was a babe born of those without who was first blessed by the gods. Should all the elemental children be wiped out not all be lost. The powers will return through a fifth who for a time will be the first, the only one."

"What is that?" Jushiro asked, "It sounds like something out of a book."

"It is," Isane said, "It's the Prophecy of Elemental Remembrance. One of my ancestors the founder of house of Kotetsu was said to have received the prophecy from Yue, the goddess of the moon herself. It was a reminder of the past and a promise that the bender's legacy would never die as long as-"

"This all very fascinating," Jushiro said interrupting her, "but where's my friend Shunsui? Where is Shunsui Kyoraku?"

"Hmm?" Isane raised a brow "The Kingdomer? You count him as a friend? He's the enemy! The Northern Water Tribe and the Eastern Fire Nation have been at war with the Earth Kingdoms for more than fifty years!"

This time it was Jushiro who raised a brow. "Fifty years? That's a long time for a war, even for people who live hundreds of years."

Isane laughed again. "That's silly. No one lives that long. Well, maybe the avatars."

"Then fifty year is really a long time," Jushiro said, "Too long. Shunsui likes to say that war makes villains out of good people."

Isane looked mad suddenly. "He's one to talk! What a hypocrite! There is nothing good about today's Earth Kingdoms! They decimated the Swamp Water Tribe!"

In so many ways this Isane Kotetsu reminded Jushiro of his third seat officer Kiyone Kotetsu. She was just as outspoken and outgoing. It kind of made sense. Isane and Kiyone were siblings_…but I don't remember Isane being like this…_ Jushiro knew Isane reasonably well. He wasn't especially close but he did know her. With his illnesses he was in and out of the fourth division's hospital more often than he wanted. Isane was the lieutenant, the second in command of Retsu Unohana the captain of the fourth division. Unohana was a talented healer and she had trained Isane well.

_I thought Isane was a quiet sort of person, _Jushiro thought, _the way she talks it's as if she was from another world! All those things she just babbled on about. They're unreal! Like nothing I've ever heard of… The name and the face are the same but the mannerisms are all different. _

"Do the words Shinigami or Zanpakuto mean anything to you?" Jushiro asked.

Isane scrunched her face up in a look of intense concentration. Thinking out loud she said, "Let's see…Shinigami…that means death god? Zanpakuto, zanpakuto, zanpakuto…that means something sword…Soul cutter sword?" Isane looked at Jushiro in a puzzled sort of way. "I've never heard of a death god before. It makes sense, I guess. I suppose-"

Jushiro interrupted her, "Forget I said anything about it."

"-a death god could exist," Kiyone kept on speaking as if Jushiro hadn't said anything, "After all there is a god of the Earth. There's a god of the Air and a goddess of Fire. Why couldn't there be a god of the fifth element spirit…"

Isane kept on speaking but Jushiro stopped paying attention. _It's rude to just ignore her but she's making me nervous!_ _She's more chatty than Kiyone! She's worse than Kiyone when Kiyone gets really mad at Sentaro! That wouldn't normally bother me much but things aren't normal! This is not Isane Kotetsu! This is not the quiet gentle healer that I've talked to before! What trick is this?_

Jushiro's voice was quiet but stern as he asked once more, "Where is Shunsui Kyoraku?"

Isane stopped speaking. She stared at Jushiro.

"I will not say it again. Where is Shunsui Kyoraku?" "Prison," was Isane's answer. "He's in the Kuruk City Prison."

Jushiro leapt out of bed. Isane jumped out of her chair, knocking it over as she moved away from him. "What are you doing?" she said, "Get back in bed!"

"Take me to him!" Jushiro shouted in a demanding tone.

Isane folded her arms. "No."

Jushiro walked toward her. The only door was past her. Isane moved her right hand using it to point at a wall. Water shot from the wall. The wall was ice! Isane surrounded Jushiro with a bubble of the water.

_I can breath? _Jushiro thought, _there's an air bubble inside this thing! _Jushiro put a hand against the water in front of him. _It's as hard as a wall! Yet it's not ice! It's not that cold!_ He found himself being lifted in the air by the strangely solid water. _It's intense water pressure. I'm sure of this! It's what's keeping this thing solid. When she said she could bend water she wasn't joking! I've got to do something but what?_

"You're my older brother's patient," she said, "You're sick. You need to rest. So you're not going anywhere! You won't be leaving until my older brother says you can. I'll make sure of that!"

"What are you doing now, little sis?" an annoyed voice said. The man who walked into the room greatly alarmed Jushiro. The face was that of Gin Ichimaru. The eyes were different though. His eyes were wide open and gentle.

"I'm not that much younger than you, Gin!" Isane said, "When are you going to stop calling me that?"

Gin's voice was teasing. His smile was a much sincere one then Jushiro could ever remember seeing on his face. "I'll stop when I feel like and not a day sooner! You'll always be little sis to me, Isane-chan."

_Sister? _Jushiro thought, _they're not siblings! Isane's only sibling is her younger sister Kiyone! _"Ichimaru!" Jushiro said, "You're supposed to be dead. What is it you want with me?"

"Ichimaru?" Gin said, "That Earth Kingdom man called me that. I'm sorry to tell you this but I'm not him. My name is Gin Kotetsu. It has always been so even before I was adopted into the main family. There's no need to look at me like that. I'm not a monster."

Gin lifted up on his tip toes to stand slightly taller than Isane. He patted her head on the head. "You can put him down now, little sis. If you don't I'll make sure all the water surrounding him soon soaks you."

"You could try." Her tone was challenging. Isane waved a hand. The water around Jushiro fell like ordinary water, drenching him through. The water was cool. He shuddered as he fell to the floor.

Gin shook his head. "That wasn't nice, little sis."

"Like you're any better," Isane said.

Jushiro started coughing. Gin bent down almost kneeling. He put a hand on Jushiro's chest. The coughing ceased. "I've never seen a illness like this," Gin said, "I can't heal it away. All I can do is soothe it. Or stop it temporarily. It's not easy to do even that much. I had the same sort of trouble with healing that Kingdomer of the frostbite."

Jushiro reached and grabbed the front of Gin's robes around his chest. "Shunsui! You mean Shunsui. Is he alright?"

"Yes," Gin said, "It was difficult but I managed to heal him." Jushiro visibly relaxed. Gin went on speaking. "Both of you have odd chi. It's been tampered with in some strange way. I would ask if you have you been the victims of chi blocking. But that wouldn't do this."

_He's talking like a concerned medic, a healer, _Jushiro thought, _Gin Ichimaru never acted like this. What's going on? _"Chi blocking?"

"He acts like he doesn't know anything," Isane said, "He pretends ignorance about things that the youngest of children know about."

"I'm not sure it's an act," Gin said, "The other one was the same. Thanks to Rangiku and some of the more militaristic of our own people I did not get to speak with him long. His confusion seemed genuine." Gin helped the weakened Jushiro to stand. He guided him back to bed.

Gin spoke to Jushiro in kind gentle tones. "Chi blocking, my good man, is the blocking of bender powers." At Jushiro's confused look, Gin went into deeper explanation. "Chi is many things. It is vast and hard to pin down. It is the metaphysical energy of the body. It is life that flows through the body. It is the connections between us and the physical world. It is the connections from one life to another, invisible threads born of friendships and love and other feelings. Chi is an all encompassing energy that humans may only understand or touch by narrowing it, limiting it. What most people grasp about chi is that for benders like us Chi the source of our powers."

'_Us' he says, _Jushiro thought, _what does he mean by that? I've never heard of benders. I'm willing to believe there are many things I don't know. One can never know it all. Powers can be changed or turned into something else. The Visored and Ichigo Kurosaki are proof of this. Powers can be lost. I knew that long ago. I've seen shinigami who had their power stripped….How could I be a 'bender'… It doesn't sound like it has anything to with spiritual energy or pressure…and at the same time it sort of does…that 'chi'…seems like I've heard that word before…I did…I thought it was Chinese philosophy…some spiritual medium of the Human World's misinterpretation of Reiyoku and Reiatsu… This is something else._

"Chi blocking," Gin said, "is the ability to hit certain spots on the body and by doing so, block the powers of a bender. It only lasts a little usually. If done to someone too often it can damage their bending powers badly. Your body shows signs of Chi damage. To a lesser degree this is true for that Kingdomer as well. It performing any water healing very difficult."

Jushiro resisted laying down. "My friend, Shunsui!" he said.

Gin's face which had been smiling and friendly, became serious. "You should not call him that. Not where there is a chance people could over hear you. He might be your friend but he is of the enemy lands. He's not just Earth Kingdom, he's an earth bender. If you say you're are friends with him you will branded a traitor."

"He is my friend," Jushiro said, "He is my oldest and dearest friend. He is nakama. I can't just abandon him. If he is imprisoned as Isane-san has said then I must get him out."

"You will. I will help you," Gin promised.

At those words Jushiro let himself relax. He didn't know why he trusted this man. He knew though that Gin Kotetsu was not Gin Ichimaru, not in body language, nor in personality. _I have to trust someone. I can't do this alone. Figuratively speaking, I hardly know up from down here. My shinigami powers are gone. My body is weakened by my illness, the worst bout in many years. I must have aid to even survive._

The cell was white. The blocks that made up the walls were not stone but ice. The prison bars were ice too. The sounds of the blizzard were very noticeable. Strangely though the cell was not freezing. It was chilly but not frozen.

A _good temperature to catch a cold in, _Shunsui thought as he paced the cell, _I would almost kill for a bowl of soup. _He was still dressed in the green outfit that his jailers were calling Earth Kingdom clothes. _At least I'm not freezing to death. There is that bright side to this. I could be out in that snowstorm. Then I would die within the hour. I don't know what's worse, a quick death without warning or a death promised withen the month._

Shunsui walked back on forth across the floor. There were furs on the floor for him to sleep on. He had been here for past several hours. The Ichimaru look-alike was a much better man than the person he resembled. The Rangiku double was much worse. Shunsui blamed her for his current predicament. He knew he wasn't being completely fair but standing here in this chilled cell did not help his mood. He was in a rare fit of anger. He wanted to hit something. He wanted to blame someone. He still hated fighting but right now a fight was something he greatly desired.

"That she-wolf in sheep's clothing," Shunsui muttered loudly his voice slowly raising, _"_That witch! That-that she-monster. Who does she think she is? The queen of the world?"

A guard walked past his cell looking at him funny. The guard was dressed in a blue anorak and pants. He had three marks painted on his forehead. His lower face was hidden by a lower mask. He carried a spear. "Hey you in there, Earth Trash! Quiet down!" the guard yelled.

Shunsui stopped speaking aloud, shifting his words to thoughts only. _She's the one who got those guards wound up. If I ever mistook her for the Rangiku I knew for even a second I was a fool. I've got to calm down. I can't help Jushiro right now. I can't even help myself. I have to accept this. Rage will only tear apart me on the inside. In a fight it would cause me to make horrible mistakes. I must be calm both outwardly and inwardly. I have to pay attention to any changes in the guards or other things around me. I have to be ready so if a chance does come, I can make my move._

Shunsui stopped pacing. He sat down on the pile of furs. Softly he whispered the words, "I wish I had a sword, preferably my zanpakuto, my Katen Kyokotsu." More softly in a sad tone, he spoke his shikai command, "Flower Wind Rage and Flower God Roar, Heavenly Wind Rage and Heavenly Demon Sneer." But of course nothing happened.

* * *

NEXT TIME: CHAPTER THREE: ESCAPE FROM THE CITY OF ICE!


End file.
